Dimitri was left confused by the question. "I always thought we were. I had always thought of you fondly," Dimitri said. And what did he even mean by 'what could you do to me'? Did Ishmael assume everything to be some sort of declaration of intended violence?

  

Ishmael snorted, perhaps because he had been needling on purpose, perhaps hoping for a fight – and there Lancaster was, being morbidly pleasant at all costs. “You won’t last a hundred years in this life,” he remarked coldly, shaking his head. The loneliness would kill him, if no one else did.

---

  

---

"You're wrong. If I was the type, I would even wager you on it." Then again if he lost said wager, that would mean he was dead or something.

  

---

Ishmael’s lip curled upwards at that protestation. If I was the type; there Dimitri was, still clinging to morals and convention at all costs. It wouldn’t serve him well, Ishmael thought, if he wanted to survive.

“Well, I look forward to you proving me wrong,” Ishmael said, as he started meandering away; and that was true, because he almost hoped the younger vampire did, that they might both be sitting here at the same lakeside in another century, happy as clams. But expecting it was a different matter entirely to hoping, so. “But I have to warn you, I’m usually right.”

---

  

---

"I will," Dimitri insisted as the other started walking away. The older vampire couldn't possibly know everything.